There are 93 days until 2017 Notre Dame Football season begins on Saturday Sept. 2nd when the Fighting Irish host Temple. If that seems like a long ways away, then consider this, ACC Media Days will be here in 51 days.
In the meantime, let’s look at what those preseason college football publications (the magazines make such great beach/poolside reading don’t they?) are saying about the Irish.
Athlon has ND playing in the Camping World Bowl (as does SB Nation which posted their bowl projections today), taking on Oklahoma State and ranked #20 nationally. The publication also includes the Irish in their “teams on the rise” feature category.
As they point out, the Irish statistically, by many different metrics, were more a team that should have finished 7-5, instead of 4-8.
That is, 2016 Notre Dame football lost only one game by more than a single possession’s worth of points and they lost four games against teams ranked in the top 36 by a touchdown or less. Of course, the Bill Parcellsism, “you are your record” still applies at the end of the day.
Athlon also sees ND finishing 8-4, and in their ranking of every quarterback in the nation, they have Brandon Winbush at #31, so not too much of a drop off from DeShone Kizer. Adjusting to life after Kizer is of course among the top Notre Dame football preseason storylines in 2017, along with the two new coordinators.
Switching over to Lindy’s, they rank the Irish 28th, but see their recruiting class 10th.
In the overview section of their team season preview, Lindy’s cuts to the chase, “while Kelly is back for an eighth season, it will be a different Kelly in terms of the program’s overall leadership. It needs to be because Kelly can’t survive another disaster like last fall. The Irish have a tough schedule and a new quarterback, but plenty of talent remains.”
Looking at Street & Smith’s, they have ND outside the top 25 nationally, but projected to the Belk Bowl versus South Carolina.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes to WGN CLTV and KOZN.
Follow him on Twitter, Instagram, Sound Cloud, LinkedIn and YouTube.